1) I guess the main reason I enjoy and stay motivated to play poker is that it's a long term sustainable hobby. It's relatively inexpensive to get started which means that even if I do go bust it doesn't require an arm an leg to start playing again. Another reason it's sustainable is the amount of fun I get out of not only playing but also studying and practising the theory and mathematics behind the game. It can take many many years of studying and practise to become even a decent player, which means that there's many more years of fun to come. It also comes with the added benefit that I can continue with my hobby whilst moving around which is awesome. Few hands of poker whilst travelling on a train? Don't mind if I do.

Another reason I stay motivated is obviously the most basic reason, to win money, I never really expect to earn enough from poker to make a living out of it, but a few little presents out of the winnings every now and again can't go amiss can it? Haha.

2) My biggest weakness by far is my inability to lay down a loosing hand just because I feel pot committed, even when I know within a 10% error margin that I've got the weaker hand I still can't lay it down. I think this happens because occasionally I'm playing with scared money, even though the money I'm playing with makes no difference to my life and isn't causing me any stress by loosing it I'm still somewhat frightened about loosing it in a big pot.

Another is occasionally I'll go on tilt and start to call and raise on hands that I should just throw away. I should probably try listening to some music in the background whilst I play, it helps me concentrate every other time.

3) Tight and aggressive playing is a style in which you play a few strong starting hands but you play them very aggressively. We do this to extract maximum profits from other players as well as making sure we have a good win rate in the long term. TAG strategy is mostly based on long term game play and profit margins, rather than focusing on short term in which you win a few big pots but over time you lose your winnings and your bankroll and you become highly susceptible to tilting.

Your motivations look great and keep in mind that, with hard work, you can achieve anything (maybe even make poker something more serious later on).

Re 2):

The music bit may help, that's really based on the individual.

However you can also try setting up some sort of stop loss where you stop playing after you've lost 2-3-4 buyins (however many you think it takes before you start to see a change, for the worse, in your game). It's a good idea to have this stop loss implemented as soon as possible.

The next step would then be to look at all the reason as to why you can't fold a hand (losing hand). It may be because you are actually somewhat tilted and don't want to fold a hand yet again. It may be because you don't actually concentrate on the hand reading during the hand and just play the absolute value of your cards (as opposed to the relative value).

If possible, I do recommend that you also start working on the mental part of your game asap. It will only help in the long run.

Re 3): You got it !

Good luck at the tables and don't forget that you can post hands you've played in our evaluation forums (where professional judges will answer them) and you can also attend our public coachings. For example, I host one on the weekends which is tailored to beginners. You can find more information here: http://www.pokerstrategy.com/coaching/178007/